Lost in Her Memories
by roopshasil
Summary: An extremely traumatic mission causes Sarada to lose her memories, setting off a chain of events which makes Boruto realise that he might just lose the special bond he has with the person he perhaps holds most dear to his heart forever. The journey to true love is never easy. Neither is recovering memories without worsening the situation. BoruSara.


**Prompt : "How could I ever forget about you?" for BoruSara!**

 **Credits to iBloo for the prompt.**

 **Disclaimer : I don't Naruto or Boruto or anything related to them.**

 **Post-Mujina arc but pre-Ao arc. After the Sasuke Shinden (2018) arc.**

 **Inspired by Detective Conan movie : Captured In Her Eyes.**

 **Angst alert.**

 **Rating T+**

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Boruto knew that ninjas faced psychological traumas pretty frequently. All around the village, he would come across ninjas of his parents' generation or before theirs, most of them with at least some degree of PTSD, depression, suicidal tendencies or other ranges of traumatised behaviour. He knew that Aunt Sakura's pioneering work had reduced the number of those afflicted with these kinds of conditions. Heck, even his own generation is grateful to her. Thanks to her, Sumire is now out of her traumatised past and living a genuinely happy and safe life.

But as he watches a teary eyed Aunt Sakura sit down beside Sarada's hospital bed and clasp one of her daughter's hand shakily with one of her own, an abysmal feeling of drowning in a pitch black ocean engulfs Boruto.

Sarada had been sent on a reporting mission with Aunt Shizune to the Land of Fire's capital city, the home of the Fire Daimyou as well as political and administrative centre. It was a relatively safe and easy B-rank mission, really, and Boruto had actually handed over a scroll full of messages and ninja souvenirs from Konoha to be delivered to Tentou while she was there. After all, Sarada had some free time while Aunt Shizune delivered general reports from the Hokage to the Daimyo. Boruto himself was going on a short training-cum-research mission with Uncle Sasuke around the same time and Mitsuki was taking advantage of the absence of his two teammates to go off for a short visit back home to Oto.

So when the extremely urgent messenger hawk from his father was sent to Uncle Sasuke in the middle of nowhere summoning them back home absolutely immediately, Boruto was sure something terrible had happened. But never in a million years had he thought he would come across Aunt Shizune at the brink of death in the operation theatre and an unconscious but otherwise unhurt Sarada in a hospital room.

Mitsuki's dishevelled form had stood there beside Sarada's bed and looked stonily at her unconscious form. He had rushed back to Konoha upon receiving an alert from Konohamaru-Sensei. Uncle Sasuke had gone to the Hokage's office and Chocho had hovered around, grimly ignoring both her food and the two boys, her eyes fixed on her unconscious best friend. The lights over the door of the operation theatre had gone off. Great Grandma Tsunade, Aunt Sakura and Aunt Ino were successful in removing the poison from Aunt Shizune's body but her life still hung on a tightrope. There was a 50:50 chance that they could loose her.

Boruto, though filthy and covered in grime from his mission and rushing back home, had refused to leave Sarada's side. From what he gleaned from the heated whispers back at his father's office between his father, mentor, Big Bro Konohamaru, Uncle Shikamaru and Uncle Sai, Kara had a hand behind this. What they wanted was unknown but a top secret researcher had been murdered by one of their Outers in the capital. Aunt Shizune who was in the vicinity had tried to apprehend the culprit but instead was outclassed and brutally defeated and left near death. Sarada, who had intervened in the fight with her sharingan activated, ended up having the memory of the traumatic event burned into her brains. A permanent memory of a bloody Shizune, the woman who was like an aunt to her and had a major role in raising her in her lonely childhood, was enough to send Sarada into a severe shock. Sarada had fainted while cradling a mortally wounded Shizune by the time Tentou could reach there with help. The culprit had already sustained good damage at both Aunt Shizune's and Sarada's hands but had managed to escape. The kunouichi duo were immediately sent back to Konoha the moment Shizune's condition stabilised a bit.

What happened to Aunt Shizune was shocking but what followed next felt as though he was stabbed by a hundred kunais at the same time. He had offered to watch over Sarada while Aunt Sakura was in the operation theatre and Uncle Sasuke was in his dad's office. Mitsuki had arrived soon afterwards followed by Chocho. All they could now was to wait for Sarada to wake up.

It was several hours before a tired and dozing Boruto heard shuffling and a groan from right beside him. He whipped up immediately from his seat. Sarada had woken up. Her dark eyes fluttered open. They were cloudy and confused as they looked around the room. She pushed herself up slowly.

"Hey! You scared us, you know-ttebasa!" Boruto grinned as he poured out water into a glass and held it out to her. "Sarada!" A joint cry of joy and relief came from Mitsuki and Chocho from where the sofa stood at the end of the room. Sarada looked at the glass Boruto held out in confusion and slowly looked up to meet his eyes.

Boruto immediately sensed that something was not right. It was the way she was looking at him. Usually a single look was enough to let him know everything about her, and her about him. Her eyes always had a mix of warmth and recognition for him. With, he daresay,….no... But right now, the way she was looking at him was so _not_ right. So unfamiliar. She had never looked at him like this. With so much confusion. With acknowledgement but with so much….lack of recognition.

Boruto felt his grin and the joyful bubble in his stomach fading away. Chocho threw herself at a startled Sarada and engulfed her into a hug and began sobbing uncontrollably.

"I am glad that you're okay!" Chocho choked out, still embracing Sarada. Sarada's eyes followed her embracer in confusion while awkwardly returning the hug. Her eyes then landed on the smiling blue-haired boy in further confusion and then moved on back to Boruto who was still holding out the glass of water.

As Chocho let go of her, she bent her head down and scrunched up her face as though she was trying to remember something really hard but was unable to. She looked up at the trio again and frowned gently.

"I am sorry but…I don't think I know you guys."

Mitsuki and Chocho exchanged baffled looks. Boruto felt his body stiffen and his gut felt as though it had been punched really hard. As Sarada's confused eyes met his widened and shocked ones, he clawed internally at the lack of recognition in her eyes. He couldn't help remember something she had said on his seventh birthday party, the first of the family events nearly forgotten by his overworked Dad, back when they were still not in Academy and were in each other's company everyday.

 _"How could I ever forget about you?"_

The next few hours flew in a flurry.

Aunt Sakura. Mitsuki. Chocho. Uncle Sasuke. Dad. Big Bro Konohamaru.

Reminders. Questions. Introductions. Promptings.

Blood tests for memory erasing drugs. A CT scan for brain damage. Then ultimately, a psychological evaluation.

By the end of it, he had a concrete answer to his question from Aunt Sakura.

 _Psychological Trauma-Induced Retrograde Amnesia._


End file.
